TO a foreigner, artist Joy Engelman's work, This Sacred Place, looks like a work of fantasy.

Joy was invited to exhibit at the Florence Biennale, 18 months ago and decided her epic three panelled landscape was worthy of the exhibition.

It proved an intelligent decision as her work won fifth place out of a field of 840 artists from around the world on December 9.

She was also awarded the Lorenzo il Magnifico Award.

The Florence Biennale is the world's biggest democratic exhibition with over 2500 works on display at the Fortezza de Basso in Florence.

She was among 12 Australian artists at the exhibition which provided her with an interesting insight into the way Australian art was perceived around the world.

“There were French and Italian artists who asked me if it was a fantasy landscape,” she said.

“I told them, 'no, that's Australia'."

Joy says her work is a reflection of Australia's changing climate and the skill of the Aborigines who survived in areas considered harsh and inhospitable by post-European Australians.

“They read the land and understood it,” she said.

“Not like us who have been here for 200 years and think we know what the weather patterns are going to be,

“It's written into the land that this is going to happen.”

So striking were her images of the dormant, dying and dead lakes around Menindee, Mungo and Willandra that one Aboriginal artist at the exhibition told her he was coming to look at her work every time he felt homesick.

Joy has thanked her sponsors, without whom she says she would never have been able to raise the money to travel to Florence.